Prolific striker Jordan Rhodes was worth making an exception for, insists Norwich City sporting director Stuart Webber.

Rhodes was thwarted from close range twice at St Andrew's, in Saturday's 2-2 Championship draw, as he looked to open his league account for the Canaries following a season long loan move from Sheffield Wednesday.

Webber has hailed the backing of City's board to make the deal happen and revealed prior to the opening day trip to the Midlands the Scottish international had also played his part.

'He actually gave up money to make this happen. That is how desperate he was to come here,' said Webber. 'Fair play to the club in backing us to sign Jordan Rhodes, because that's not a normal deal I would normally be involved with because my tradition is usually younger players, and Daniel (Farke's), with lower cost and developing them.

'But it's been really good to get a really serious Championship striker in, so we're grateful for that.

'It's difficult because we all know the hardest part of football is scoring goals, that's why strikers cost the most money.'

Onel Hernandez's Birmingham brace was a positive step but Webber knows City had to address a chronic goal shortage even before the sales of James Maddison and Josh Murphy.

MORE: Have your say on our Pinkun forum'We've tried to rectify it with the signings of Jordan and Teemu Pukki, Kenny McLean has scored goals in his career, we've tried to do it in different ways,' said Webber.

'Daniel has spent a lot of time in pre-season trying formations to try and score more goals and create more opportunities.

'If you look at last season we did struggle to score goals and earlier in the season we struggled to create goals, so it's not just down to the striker or the midfielders, it's the whole team.

'We're not stupid, we knew that was a major area we had to develop and we've lost our main goal-scorers from last year.

'We hope we can replace that and contribute from different areas and not rely on one person as well.

'That was one thing, at times last year, that we needed a moment of magic from a player such as James to get us a result. He did that for us and we're grateful for that but the onus can't be on one person, we need to be a better team and a better team of individuals.'